Capturing 46th Title, Hannah Kearney Ends Her Moguls Career on Top

Five years after Hannah Kearney won an Olympic gold medal in moguls skiing, her dream came true: She closed out her international career with a victory in Sunday’s dual moguls event at the F.I.S. Freestyle World Cup finals in Megève, France.

The title was Kearney’s 46th, matching the record for moguls World Cup victories, set in 1997 by another American, Donna Weinbrecht.

Kearney, 29, said she would not reconsider her decision to retire after the United States championships this month, adding that if she goes to the 2018 Olympics, it would be as a television commentator, not as a competitor.

She reiterated Monday what she had said in January during a World Cup stop in Utah.

“I think the dream as an athlete is to go out on top,” Kearney said in a teleconference with reporters. “You don’t want to hang on so long that you can no longer be competitive. The goal is to be able to choose your retirement because it’s a good time in your life to do so and not because your body has given out or you can no longer make it to the top of your sport and you feel like your best days are behind you.”

For Kearney, Sunday’s victory was all the sweeter because she was the most technically sound on the final run, when it most mattered.

“I felt like: ‘Yes! I just skied a good run when I was supposed to,’ ” Kearney said.

In the aftermath of her gold-medal performance in the Vancouver Games, Kearney found small flaws in her victorious run that fueled her training for the next four years. She won the bronze medal at the 2014 Olympics with a performance that she considered superior to the one that had won her the gold medal.

Kearney said she would make “no claims” on leading the sport’s evolution.